Informal Institutions, CPR's and the Social Context of Fairness; Forest and Pasture Management in a Village in the Indian Himalaya, 1987-92

Abstract

From Introduction:

"Durable institutions for the management of common-pool resources (CPRs) have been studied as parts of the complex conjunctions between natural systems, human institutions and individual agents, as well as in the context of general 'design principles' necessary for their success (Berkes 1989; Bromley 1992; Ostrom 1990, Ostrom 1994). While these studies have provided much valuable information about the mechanisms, procedures and principles that distinguish successful CPR institutions, there are other issues which can broadly be categorized as cultural - such as the role of norms, fellow-feeling and community in CPR regimes or the implications of diversity in perceptions of self-interest and understandings of nature - that have been relatively neglected.

"While the study of CPR institutions has so far yielded many lessons for resource management policies, there is need to supplement such gains with studies that pay closer attention to cultural, normative and perceptual variations within the broad set of institutional dynamics that characterize CPR regimes. I believe the concepts and tools to begin this exist though they do not seem so far to have been used for the specific analysis' of CPRs. In this paper I will deal with two illustrative issues: the role of perceptions of fairness and understandings of ecosystem resilience in social interactions related to CPR management."